Front Lines (Front Lines #1)(105)

The column jounces and sputters past, truck after truck, until a green-painted ambulance adorned with a red cross very similar to the one on Frangie’s helmet appears. Behind it, just ahead of the final half-track, an open, slat-sided truck full to overflowing with wounded Germans.

“You,” the Doctor-Major orders, and shoves Frangie toward the truck. She catches the tailgate and climbs aboard on shaky legs to be met with hostile stares from men with every variety of battlefield injury. One man winks at her and grabs his crotch suggestively. Another spits in her general direction, though with insufficient force, so it lands on the helmet of a man who is either unconscious or dead.

Frangie sits as far back as she can from the more threatening enemy soldiers. A private running from the ambulance tosses her a small box marked with the red cross. It contains bandages, tape, scissors, and sulfa powder. There’s a smaller box that should contain morphine, but it’s been emptied, presumably to keep her from killing one of the Germans or herself.

That last thought lingers in her mind. She is a prisoner. She is a woman. And with sick dread she knows what to expect.

But for now there’s a man with a bandage the color of old meat. She will change that bandage and worry about the rest later.





33

RIO RICHLIN—TUNISIAN DESERT, NORTH AFRICA

“Nothing we could do up against tanks, right?” Tilo says.

“Fugging bazooka bounced off,” Corporal Hark Millican says, not for the first or last time. “How we supposed to stop tanks with that? Like throwing a fugging water balloon.” He has previously compared the bazooka shell to a baseball, a rock, and a watermelon.

“What do you expect?” Luther snaps. “We’re fighting with girls against men. I always said this was doomed. I always said that.”

Stick says, “As far as I can tell, the only one who inflicted any casualties on them was a girl.”

“Because the men are too busy looking out for the women, that’s what,” Geer insists furiously. “Girls and a goddamned Jap. We’re cursed.”

Hansu Pang cannot help but hear this. He clamps his jaw tight but says nothing and no one comes to his defense. The fact that Pang did exactly what he was ordered to do and performed as well as anyone means nothing; he has the face and the hair and, above all, the eyes of a Jap. And scared, beaten men need an excuse. Blame the women, blame the Jap, blame the officers all the way up the chain of command, blame anyone but themselves.

They’ve lost Cassel. They’ve lost their medic. And, to make matters worse, everyone has earlier overheard the furious British captain reaming out Lieutenants Liefer and Helder, before leading his men off.

“You ran, you silly bastards,” he raged. “We could have managed a fighting withdrawal, but you broke and ran.”

To which Liefer had responded by making things worse. “I can only be as good as my people. These are green troops.”

“Young lady, it’s a bloody poor officer that blames her men,” the captain shot back savagely. “I’ve got five of my boys dead and one so shot up he won’t be long joining them. And you were well in the rear, Lieutenant. That fact will be in my report, you may count on it.”

And with that the British commandos double-timed past them, not without harsh words from some of the Tommies.

“Soft Yank bastards.”

“Americans, my arse.”

“You fight like women. Oh, too right: you are women.”

Rio does her best to ignore the taunts. She ignores, too, the unsettling mix of respect and resentment that comes from being the only one in the squad to provably hit an enemy soldier.

She watches it in her memory. She sees the Italian through her sights. She feels the pressure of her finger on the trigger. He trips. He falls. Just a stumble.

No, he’s hit. He’s fallen. He’s bleeding into the sand. Just like Cassel.

She wants to walk with Sergeant Cole, but she resists. It would be like clinging to her parents, and she’s past that, she’s not a little girl needing her father. She’s a soldier, right? A soldier.

Instead she walks with Jenou, good old Jenou who can always perk her up with chatter about boys and girls and clothing and hairstyles and . . .

“What was it like?” Jenou asks her.

There’s no doubt in Rio’s mind what her friend means. “It’s my job, right? I just did my job.”

Jenou lets a few paces pass. “You were pretty cool under pressure.”

“No different than anyone else,” Rio says, trying to shut her friend down. She’s feeling, feeling way too much now that the fight is past. She’s like a steam boiler, pressure building up inside, a churning feeling. She wants to scream.

Everyone just shut up.

“Bet there’s lions out here, up in those rocks. Mountain lions.” Cat walking just a few steps behind.

Again with the lions. Give it a rest, Preeling, shut up, just shut up and let us march.

“Probably eating the guts out of that Italian you shot,” Cat says.

Rio spins to face her. Rio is vibrating, all of her body straining to contain the pressure. She wants to snarl at Preeling, but can’t find the words. Her clenched and cocked fist hovers, trembling, before dropping to her side.

Rio grits her teeth and starts walking again. Jenou has at last realized her friend is upset. “Don’t pay any attention, Rio. Let it go.”